The idea of a chat area here has obviously been in the air lately but honestly I really don't see the added value of such a feature.
I use the arcade forums as a valuable and ever growing source of information and that's been helping me out in this hobby countless times.
I have the feeling that many important arcade informations will be lost forever in those chats, that's a pity for the whole community.
Plus, I really enjoy browsing DLF when I have some free time, it's great to be able to tell that for instance you have 15 minutes to spend and that you can focus on reading/answering the topics you're the most interested in.
In a live chat you're more likely to be dragged in a conversation and will probably have to stop it at some point just because you're running out of time.
On the contrary, in a forum, you have all the time you need to answer properly which makes it usually more interesting to read.
Plus I already spend waaaay too much time in front of a computer/smartphone, I just don't need "one more convenient way to be easily reachable".
Skype is doing a great and free job for whoever is into live chatting so why not create a group of arcade chatters there for whoever might be interested?
That might do the trick as well.
Most of these reasons are selfish, but that's just my point of view.
Anyway just like you will never see Ully playing pinball or Level42 playing a DL cab, I swear you will never see me in the chatbox